February 25, 2009

Welcome to my home. Please come with me into the corner of my living room.......

Above the cabinet I have a few pictures and a shadow box displayed. The shadow box is where I'm taking you on this oh, wow! Wednesday.

I went back to that corner for some reason or other (I've been busy around the house today) and I happened to look at the teeny little footprints that are in the bottom section of the box.

{sigh}

Those teeny little footprints that belong to, as of now, my comparatively large children.

Oh, wow! Look how little their feet were.

The shadow box is very special to me. It was my grandparent's silverware drawer for many years. When it came into my possession I envisioned creating some sort of display with it and this is what I came up with....

The porcelain shoes in the bottom section were gifts from my doctor group.... they have the child's name, birthday, height and weight printed on them. I created the footprints by scanning in the image of their inked footprints in their baby books, then printing them out on a transparency that was cut to fit the section.

The top sections have a picture of teeny Benjamin and teeny Sarah (her head fit in Todd's palm); the blue bunny slipper is Ben's and was from his first Easter; the two tins in the middle have hair from each of their first hair cuts; the baby spoon is Oneida and was used to feed both of them; the giraffes are from a Noah's ark set that decorated their room; and the rose is from an arrangement we got when Sarah was born (you can see the roses in the photo of her).

February 20, 2009

You know, it doesn't take much to excite me. Little things (like the blimp). Unexpected things. Things I never knew about and now think are one of the greatest things since sliced bread.

Like this morning... I got out the orange juice container from the refrigerator and went to turn the cap off. I wasn't really looking at the cap, I just saw where it was with my peripheral vision because I was talking to the kids who were sitting at the table eating breakfast. I felt something was different the moment I touched it. Usually the cap is round with a flat top. This cap felt funny, so I stopped what Iwas doing and looked at it. (Now, this is where my kids, who know how I am, just kind of roll with it.) "OH my goodness, LOOK at THIS CAP!!!!!!!! It's soooooo cool!!!!!!!!" I take it over to show them and they're like, yea, that's cool mom.

It's shaped like an orange!!!!!! With the little leaves printed behind it!!!! C'mon - that's COOL! Okay. Maybe it's just the designer in me, but I find stuff like that totally awesome. Package design was one of my favorite classes in college. That lid is just so clever.

The other thing that has me skipping for joy right now is this flexible, collapsible little piece of material....

Anyone know what it is???? I never heard of it until last night. I had my second intermediate digital SLR course last night at Dan's and we learned about white balance. I knew what white balance is, per se. For example, it's like when you take a picture indoors at night and your shot looks orange because of the incandescent lighting - the white balance is off and it affects your picture. So our instructor showed us this handy dandy makes me happy happy white balance card.

I won't go into the specifics and bore you, but look what it does when you use it with the one touch white balance feature on the camera......

Oh, I am so glad I now know about this little white balance card. I take a lot of product pictures for myself and my sister in law and this will help tremendously with getting the color right.

See, it doesn't take much to make me happy. Just little things. So, that is your mission for the weekend: find something small and seemingly insignificant that really excites you. Enjoy it. If you get a chance, leave a comment and let me know about your happy happy thing. I'll get excited about it with you! :-)

(oh, that is a peek into my *new bathroom* by the way..... I'm waiting for a print that I am having custom framed to be done, then I'll do the big reveal.) :-)

February 18, 2009

Today's oh, wow! Wednesday is not about a flash to the past. It is about a wow! from today... And finding out that sometimes, it pays to procrastinate when it's time to start making supper. Why? Because you never know when your husband is going to call at 5:00 p.m. and ask you how many Maine lobsters do you want for supper? (he got them from someone at work)

Thank goodness I hadn't put anything on the stove to cook yet when he called! What a treat - can you give me an oh, wow! ? :-)

I'm hoping to get in more playing with paper time today. The kids are home today because of the President's Day holiday and they are busy playing in the other rooms. As long as they don't need a referee I can probably get more layouts made. LOL

We took the kids to sign up for Spring sports this morning (Sarah, for softball and Ben, for baseball). Now I have 60 candy bars (fundraiser) to sell or eat. Anyone want a candy bar???? Because if those things are sitting on my counter I am so sooooo weak and I will cave in and eat them. Anyone? $1.00 a bar. Anyone? help. :-) LOL

My valentine part #1 from Todd was a trip through the laserwash 4000 car wash on the way home. We sat in line over half an hour until it was our turn but, man!, that was the coolest thing! A laser measures your car and then the machine knows exactly where to spray the water and soap. Now our Envoy is no longer the color of dirt. It's actually a pretty blue - I forgot what it looked like! And I can stop telling the kids stay away from the car don't touch the car move back from the car.

Valentine part #2 will be the installation of towel bars this afternoon in our new bathroom. He was going to stop and buy me roses but I told him, honey, if you put in those towel bars with a smile on your face no matter how many extra holes you accidentally make and how bad you want to cuss, I will consider that the best valentine gift you could give me this year. He told me to get the plaster ready. (My husband and home improvement jobs do not go well together.... kind of like oil and vinegar.)

edited to add: they are in and he said to me I didn't curse even once. LOL

Since we're honoring LOVE today, I have some good news for those of you that LOVE the new Marks Paper Company lines and put your name in to win in my giveaway, but didn't get picked. You can go to my new friend Ching's blog, because she is now having a giveaway of the two new lines!!! She also set up a Facebook group for Marks Paper Company. Join the fun and spread the LOVE for MPCo!!!!!